Capital Punishment

7 Pages 1720 Words

6. This is a low number compared to 199 persons executed in 1935 (Cole 451). The reason for this slow execution rate is the process of appeals, from sentencing to execution there is about a seven to eight year wait. The convict's cases' are reviewed by the state courts and through the federal courts (Cole 451). With all this opportunity for the case to be turned over or the sentence to be changed it is almost impossible for an innocent person to be executed. Only two people have been proven innocent after their execution in the United States. These wrongful deaths occurred in 1918 and 1949 (Death Penalty Discussion). Since then the justice system has undergone a lot of fine-tuning which makes their mistakes extremely unlikely today. The death penalty is the harshest form of punishment enforced in the United States today. Once a jury has convicted a criminal of an offense he/she moves to the second part of the trial, the punishment phase. If the jury recommends the death penalty and the judge then agrees the criminal will face some form of execution, lethal injection is the most common f...